


Penultimate

by biswholocked



Series: 221s [6]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 221, Angst, Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-02
Updated: 2014-06-02
Packaged: 2018-02-03 03:59:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1730303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/biswholocked/pseuds/biswholocked
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>penultimate (adj): next to the last</p>
    </blockquote>





	Penultimate

**Author's Note:**

> penultimate (adj): next to the last

He always regretted those words, said in haste but echoing in the lab nonetheless. _You machine_. Every time he thought of it, a stab of pain and guilt hit his chest, making John lose his breath. Had he known that it would be the last time he’d see Sherlock before...god, he wouldn’t have stormed away in anger. He should have stayed, like he always did, but he hadn’t. And now Sherlock was dead.

The memories would come at the oddest of times, a crippling blow that left his eyes watering and lungs gasping for air. In the tea aisle at Tesco’s, remembering precisely what kind of tea he liked and how _he_ always insisted upon the correct ratio of milk, tea, and sugar.  A piece of graffiti in a particular shade of yellow, slamming him with the emotions he’d felt when he’d come home to see that bloody smiley face on the wall-amusement, exasperation, and a bit of worry.

And of course the nightmares, there were those too. Watching him, watching _Sherlock_ die night after night, falling from the rooftop. Sometimes John was there, pushing him; sometimes he was an onlooker who couldn’t do anything, but more often it played out just as it really had-hearing Sherlock’s end of the line go dead.

London wasn’t a battlefield-it was a graveyard.

 

 


End file.
